Way back in 2006 we got a call for a little guy named “A”. They told us that he was 11 months old. We knew that D & d’s mom was pregnant and due at some point in the early part of the year, but we didn’t know exactly when so we went ahead and said yes to A. It turns out that he was 23 months old… And it was a disaster of a placement. We had three little boys ages 1, 2, & 3… and in the month and a half that A was with us, they all had birthdays. Crazy times!

Right in the middle of all of that our Vinny was born. We’d been hoping that Vinny would come to us straight from the hospital. Looking back, it’s likely a good thing that didn’t happen. We were still baby foster parents at that point. I don’t know if we could have handled a newborn with D & d and I know for a fact that we couldn’t have with A added into the mix. Although, I would have loved to have spent the beginning of Vin’s life with him.

When he was just a little guy, he got to see his big brothers every week. They went on visits to see their bio-mom and Vin was there with her. I even have a picture of their bio-mom when she was pregnant with Vin 🙂

When he was about six months old, the boys stopped having visits with her. So, they stopped seeing him, too. We’d pretty much given up hope of having him as a part of our family.

That’s why we were in shock when we got a call a year later! In that year, they’d severed the rights for D & d’s parents. And we’d taken placement of our little Bean. We were literally only a couple weeks away from adopting D & d when we got the call that would (again) change our lives. The lawyer for Vin called us to ask if we knew that he was in foster care. She wanted to know if we wanted her to let the caseworker know that we were interested in taking placement. Of course, we said yes! I remember calling our agency (somewhat frantically) trying to see what we’d need to do to get our license changed.

It turns out that I didn’t need to change the license. I needed patience instead!

We got that first call about Vin in July of 2007, but it wasn’t until October 1st that he was *finally* moved to our home. I can’t say that I really was all that patient. I know that I made more than my fair share of phone calls before his placement finally happened.

When he showed up I couldn’t believe my eyes. No, really, I thought they had the wrong address! Where did those baby blues come from?

Can you believe those eyes?

So, poof, we were a family of 6. I had always joked that the reason that Vin was never placed with us was that I didn’t look like the mom of a Vinny. And, yet, I was.

When he came he was only 20 months old. Such a little guy. Bean was 10 months old at the time. And I had my hands very full. I tell new foster parents that the first few weeks of having a foster placement are really bad. But, you won’t remember them, so you’ll be willing to do it again. When he came to us, we knew what the roller coaster of being a foster parent meant. We’d been through the torture of court dates and extensions and visits. With your first foster placement, you don’t know any better. This time, we knew what was ahead of us and we still wanted to dive on in.

As with all foster children, the plan for Vinny was reunification. He was in foster care while his biological family had the time to work on their issues and work the case plan so they could get him back. Another layer of his story was an out of state relative. He had lived with a couple in a different state for several months before coming into care. They loved him very much (still do) and were also asking the courts to have him moved to live with them.

We knew all of this from day 1, so my mission was to get as much out of this chance as possible. I wanted to give the boys the chance to know their brother (all three). I didn’t know if he’d be here for a week or a month or forever. So, I reminded myself as often as possible (although, not often enough) to get out the camera so that I would always have at least a piece of him.

You try getting 4 kids to look at you and smile..

So, it began. Our lives as his parents. When he had first come into care, they hadn’t called us because he’d been living with the out of state family who only spoke Spanish. So, they looked for a Spanish speaking foster home. They never asked us if we spoke Spanish! I translated for the first few weeks, maybe even a month. I was the crazy lady walking through the grocery store with a bunch of kids, speaking Spanish to the white kid and English to the Mexican kids. Even though Vin didn’t talk much at that point (can’t say the same now!) he still stumped us on a few words in Spanish. It was Halloween time & our neighbors used to make a haunted house. When he’d see their house he’d say, “Cucui”.. We had no clue what he meant, but we have some friends who helped us out.

We were also lucky to have friends who helped us with clothes for our little guy. He came with very little and an amazing mom from a chat board that I frequent sent a whole box of clothes for him. I remember sitting there going through the box with tears streaming. It was such a hard time for us and to have a “stranger” reach out and care about our little guy meant the world.

Back then, Vin was having visits twice a week with his biological parents. He’d go see his bio-dad one day a week and then his bio-mom one day a week.

It was hard.

Even though he liked being at the visits, he hated to go. He’d run and cry when they’d come to pick him up.

And, it was hard on the older boys. They didn’t really “get” what made Vin their brother when he was a stranger. And they didn’t understand why he went to see his bio family.

But, time went by. And we figured things out. The guy who’d come to get Vin started bringing a Lego catalogue with him and Vin would happily go with him. Eventually, the visits moved to McDonald’s and Vinny couldn’t wait to go.

Over time Vinny became as natural as every other part of our family. We figured out how to take four kids in public. He learned how to hold my hand in the parking lot. He started talking and could tell us what he wanted. And he started to become Vinny. He’s never looked at things the same way our other kids do. He’s always surprised us. Last Christmas, we went to the mountains to go see Brian’s parents. When we were talking about the snow Vinny was very concerned. He was worried that he wouldn’t be able to breathe in the snow. That’s just the way that his mind works.

He’s definitely been a challenge to how our minds work. We don’t know much about his life before us. But, we do know that he’s slow to trust. We know he’s very intelligent and at times even a little wise. And we know that he’s our son–through and through.

In the middle of 2008, the visits that Vin was having with his biological dad stopped. And the visits with his biological mom were erratic.

Of course, we were hoping that this meant that he was getting closer and closer to being ours forever. But, foster care would never be that easy. In January of 2009, Vin had a new caseworker who was ready to move him back into his biological mom’s house. I left court that day in tears. Thankfully, his Guardian ad Litum (GAL or lawyer) stepped up and asked that the court do a little more investigation before he was moved.

In the time that the courts and the case worker did bonding assessments and looked more at his needs, we spoke to his biological mom a few times. She became more comfortable with us. And, eventually, she told the caseworker and the judge that she was ready to give up her rights.

Since we hadn’t heard from bio-dad in such a long time, we thought that severance for him would go very quickly. And, as you know, nothing is quick in foster care! So there were delays.

But, now we’re here. Today we were able to finally adopt our son!

Court was on time (wow! shocker!), and we were so lucky to have a court room full of friends and family to support us on this very joyous occasion. And I only cried a little.

Thank you for all of your support and love over the past few years on this road to forever.

And, no, that’s not a nice calm “Ahhh…. “, you know a sigh… it’s more of a, “What the heck was I thinking? Can someone please slow down time? How will it all get done?”, kind of scream.

I cannot believe that time decided just now to speed up. It’s so unfair!

Only 2 more days until court. I was talking to V about it on the drive to Head Start. And I started to cry.

V: Why are you crying?

Me: Because I’m so happy that you’re going to be all mine.

V: I love you, Mommy. You’re the best Mommy.

Then he reached out and we held hands for a bit. Oh, shoot, here come the water works again!

I updated my list of R.S.V.P.’s (I know nobody is surprised that I have it all on an excel file) and right now it looks like we’re going to have right around 60 people here to celebrate on Saturday. I am so excited to see everyone. It is something that *needs* to be celebrated. But, at the same time, that number is feeling a little scary. I really need to focus if I want to get the house clean & ready for a crowd. I can’t wait to see those of you who are local. And, for our farther away friends, I will be posting about a million photos very soon! I’ll be able to (finally) post photos of our cute little guy. And I will want to share our celebration with you via the computer.

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In a totally different area of life (not that life can be divided–it completely refuses to when I ask it), I have gotten actual comments on this blog from people I don’t know “in real life”. And I’m so excited! I’m so honored that someone would read about us and our journey. I love reading other people’s blogs. But, I’m really bad about posting comments. So, a huge “Thanks” to anyone who doesn’t “know” me who’s chosen to learn more about us. And a huge “Thanks” to those of you who’ve passed along this site.

One of the things that was so interesting about the beginning of our foster careers to B & I was how little we really knew. We didn’t know how the system worked. We weren’t aware of parent’s rights, we knew nothing about the courts. We had a hard time finding services and figuring out what our role really was. And I started teaching PS-MAPP for that very reason. I don’t want anyone to go into fostering without knowing (at least a little) what’s in store for them. And, now as we’re nearing the end of this era… V will be our final adoption… I only hope that our experience will live on through another family that picks up the torch and decides that they are ready to foster. I hope that I can help at least one family along that road…

I think it’s an amazing way to build a family and can be the greatest gift given to a child.

That being said, I don’t think it should be forced on a father. If a dad wants to raise his child, that is his right. And it’s not about the best parents. It really isn’t. If it were, then would anyone you know be a parent? Are they really the “best” option? There are people out there with more money, more resources, more education that I have. Certainly, there are women who have cleaner homes… You get the drift. It can’t be about the “best”.

It’s an odd thing.

Foster parents fall in love with their children and they often are quick to judge the biological family. The truth is that life is complicated. There are so many choices each and every day. Who knows what life could have in store? There are exceptions, but, by in large, most of these biological parents love their children. Many of them weren’t loved or didn’t feel loved when they were children. They weren’t taught how to love themselves. How do we expect them to love and care for these children? And even when they’re doing how, how do we expect them to live up to our impossibly high standards?

It’s easy to write off the biological parents as losers, addicts, generally horrible people. But, where does that get us? What does that do for the child? And how do we know?

If you were judged by the worst decision you ever made every single day, what would your life be like? Think about the lies you’ve told, the feelings you’ve heart… Think about when you were young and dumb and self-centered. How do you look next to the young mom who made bad choices? Sure, maybe yours didn’t cut as deep or hurt for so long, but you’ve still made mistakes.

The bottom line is that these aren’t our kids. They’re not “yours” until the adoption.

And that can be hard.

You have to love them like your own. You have to give away your heart knowing that it’s going to be broken. You have to be the bigger one out of the whole situation. The one who gives without expecting to receive. And, if you’re exceedingly lucky, maybe that child will get to be a part of your forever family. But, even if they aren’t, they’ll take a piece of you onto the rest of life. They’ll have been given the gift of a parent who loved without judging. And I think that is a pretty precious gift to give.

So, on Tuesday a prop passed in Arizona. It was very publicized. It was for a new 1% sales tax. The money that it raises are to go to education and public safety. What a lot of people probably don’t know is that a big chunk of that money is also going to DES (the Department of Economic Security). DES is the department that CPS (Child Protective Services) falls under.

At school events and foster care events we were told over and over again how important it was to support this prop. Now, I can’t say that I did then nor do I now.

Another thing you might or might not know is that last year as a foster parent, our reimbursement was cut 20% and the additional funds were cut more.. most of them by 50% and some were scrapped altogether. There’s nobody getting rich doing foster care. Or, if they are, their idea of rich is far different than mine. Foster care reimbursement varies from state to state and sometimes even varies based by what county or city you’re in. There’s no consistency in foster care across the country. Heck, here, if you’re fostering a Native American child you re reimbursed at a rate of nearly three times the amount that you’d be receiving for a child the same age of a different race (a child that doesn’t fall under the Indian Child Welfare Act or ICWA).

Now, I don’t know about you, but my expenses didn’t go down 20% last year. I haven’t been able to feed the little guy 20% less or buy him clothes half as often as I’ve needed to in the past. We get about $20 a month to spend on clothing for our little guy. Now, he’s still in toddler clothes and I am a master shopper (thanks, Mom!) so I can buy an outfit for that much. But, what happens during the months that he needs shoes? What about the number of socks that he runs through by wearing them outside (he’s a little rebel)?

So, I’m thinking that now that I’m paying 1% more for everything, I should get a raise… It’s only fair, right? It was a temporary cut…

So, we have news. This is the big announcement. The adoption date for our little guy is… (drum-roll,please)…. in forever and a day! Whaaa-whaaa….

I wish it were really funny, so I could at least laugh about it. But, it’s not. The courts made a mistake with paperwork and at this point one of his parents still has his/her biological rights. Now, the question you may have on your mind is, what does that mean? Basically it means that they’ll do the whole severance trial all over again. And that takes time. Likely it’ll be several more months until the severance is completed again. Once that is done, we can file a petition for adoption. Once the petition is filed we’ll have about 60 days until we can have our adoption hearing. You should know that 60 days is the expedited adoption date.

So, our wait is now longer. By at least a couple months.

It’s really not fair.

I think that it would be an easier pill to swallow if the same thing hadn’t happened before. When our older boys were in foster care we had to go to three hearings that were all the exact same. One time papers hadn’t been filed correctly, the next time the mom didn’t show. When you’re a foster parent in the court room, you’re meant to be seen and not heard. And I did a really good job following those rules (surprisingly) until the second continuance of that hearing, I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. In case you were wondering, that is not a good idea. The judge totally saw me do it and he addressed me (and the court) saying that it’s very important to follow the details so that his findings wouldn’t be overturned upon appeal.

So, logic dictates that I hold my tongue and be peaceful about this latest stall. I have no worries about our future. He will be my forever son one day. And that has to be good enough right now.

So, last night was class number two on attachment disorders. And I’m a little out of sorts now. Before the class last night I felt like we were doing well. I felt like I almost didn’t need that class. Then I started talking about our little guy’s behaviors… And I think we have a long way to go.

Attachments are like a spider web. They build one upon another. Just like making friends. You make one, then you meet their friends and add to the group.

One of the most common issues (in my opinion) that foster and adoptive kids have is attachment disorder.

So, I’ve started to educate myself. I’ve taken classes in the past about infant brain development. And the common thread is always that the first three years are crucial. That children need to trust by having one primary care giver.

But, what happens when they don’t get that? The short answer is that their brains don’t form the same as typical kids. Parts of the brain that aren’t used, don’t develop the same way. With neglect, the brain is often physically smaller than a typical child.

I’ve seen the slides and the photos and the evidence.

I’ve never had anyone tell me what to do after the fact.

Last night I was given hope for the first time. This damage can be reversed! I took the first class in a four part series on attachment disorders. The leader is a therapist that specializes in attachments and I’m so excited. I am hoping that this training will help me be a better parent.

Already, I feel better just thinking that I can actually undo some of the damage.

Here are just a couple of the Bean. More to follow soon of my boys! I have a ton that are very cute that I can’t share because my little guy is in all of them. On that note, his *adoption* caseworker was supposed to be here today, but ended up running late. So, tomorrow she’ll be out and we’ll start on the next batch of paperwork. The end is near!

Is it any wonder that I get *nothing* done around the house? I start in one place and end up clicking through blog upon link upon blog. Somehow I ended up reading several blogs on adoption this morning. And I almost feel like I’m the newbie. What do all of those words mean? Is my vocab wrong?

There are “first moms” and “second moms”… what happened to birth and adoptive? Or biological?? Are those offensive now?

In the classes I teach, we call our foster and adoptive families “resource families”. I don’t know that it properly explains anything though.

Recently, I got a letter from the bio-grandma of our boys. I was shocked. It was a good surprise though. I never expected to hear anything from that biological family. We’ve left the door wide open and hope that we can help our boys fill in the blanks when they’re older…

And I am thankful that she wrote. The letter and its contents will be for them in the future, when they are ready (or, when we think they are ready). I am so glad that she has chosen to stay in their lives, at least in some small way.

I have amazing children. And it’s not all Brian and I parenting that has made them so. They didn’t come from a void (this is one of my famous quotes…). They came from parents and families and cultures that are different from ours.

And I don’t think that’s a bad thing.

I want them to grow and love themselves. I want them to know both who they are and where they came from. And I don’t really know any way to do this other than having an open adoption. I’ll never be able to answer their questions about their biological families. No matter what I do or how hard I try, they will likely have doubts and fears that I won’t be able to fill, only their biological families will be able to fill those voids.

At the same time, I can’t force the relationship either.

We can only open the door, we can’t pull anyone through.

This letter from bio-grandma was the first contact that we’ve had from any bio-family in years.

Sigh.

I don’t know that I’ve really been able to state my thoughts. But, maybe I’ve been able to provide a little food for thought?

I feel like I don’t want to burden my husband or my family anymore than I already have.

I just finished reading a book called, An Unlit Path. It’s the story of a family who adopted some very hurt children and their story. She went through so much more than we have. Yet, she glossed through years in just a page or two. She didn’t touch on the transitioning of placements. She just talked about the happiness of most times.

I honestly think that if I were to write a book down the road, I could just as easily gloss over these years. I’m sure that time will change my perspective. I’m sure that my wounds will heal. I’m sure that these days will amount to nothing. But, it just doesn’t feel like that now. As we were making the decision to disrupt and to have our youngest two foster children moved, I reminded my husband how bad the first few days, weeks, months were with Daniel and David. And they really were *that* bad. One day, I remember parking the car in a gas station lot and just getting out and crying on the curb in front of the car. The boys were inside happily listening to the radio. I knew they were safe and I knew I needed to get out some of the pain. They’d completely distroyed a playroom in a matter of 20 minutes while I’d been doing the enrollment paperwork for Head Start. They’d literally taken every single toy, book, block, shelf, part that they could reach down. And it took me nearly an hour to put everything back where it was supposed to go.

Looking back, I’d totally overreacted. Nobody was hurt. Nothing was lost. It was o.k. But, that day I had a big old mommy melt down. I’m sure that we’d been having behaviors at home. I know that they wore me down.

That’s where I am right now, too. I’m not quite healthy. And neither are the kids. They all have runny noses, or coughs, or fevers, or a combination. Brian is doing his best to avoid it, but he’s already had one pretty rough bout with it.

And there’s still uncertainty. It’s certain that these children will be leaving. And, it feels like, there’s certainty about where they’re going. But, nobody will say the time and day. And I need to know.

I hate myself for not being sad about them leaving. But, at this point, I’m just ready for the move. Yet, I know that when they’re gone, I will mourn for them.

There’s so much that needs to be done. There is laundry and cleaning and packing and organizing. There’s just playing and being a mom. There’s planning meals and planning for a trip. But, I find myself just shutting down. So I sit her crying.

Right now the little ones are sleeping, getting the rest that they need to let their bodies heal. Littlest girl has done some acting out today, more “stealing” food, more changing clothes, more just not listening… She is feeling the strain, too. She is just beginning to feel comfortable here and she knows that there will be changes. I try to talk to her about what’s happening, but her vocabulary isn’t very big and it’s hard to know what she understands. I feel like she will do so well in the next home. I feel like she will be an amazing little girl in such a short amount of time. I just know that she needs to move. And I hate to make her.

I think that guilt is a huge part of what is weighing me down. How do I let go of that? How do I cope? I know that time will ease this pain. Just as sure as I am that the sun will come up tomorrow, I am sure that our family will come through this stronger than we were a few months ago before we started this latest chapter in our book. I just wish that knowlege was enough to give me the peace that I need so desperately right now.